Trump pick to lead consumer bureau clears key Senate hurdle

By Douglas Gillison and Pete Schroeder

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -A Senate banking panel voted on Thursday to advance President Donald Trump's nomination of former regulator Jonathan McKernan to lead the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, an agency the White House has effectively put on ice since last month.

The 13 to 11 vote, which saw all Republicans vote in favor and all Democrats against, clears McKernan's nomination for a vote by the full Senate at a later date.

The panel also approved the nominations of William Pulte to lead the Federal Housing Finance Agency and Stephen Miran as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers.

From 2023 until last month, McKernan served as a Republican board member at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, where he was an outspoken critic of former Chairman Martin Gruenberg's response to a sexual harassment scandal and oversaw reform efforts.

While Trump and key adviser Elon Musk have said that the CFPB should be eliminated, McKernan pledged in confirmation hearings last month that he would "fully and faithfully" enforce consumer financial laws but he criticized the agency for what he viewed as excessive enforcement and regulatory overreach.

In the midst of his testimony, the agency's current leadership dismissed five pending enforcement actions brought by the prior administration, an unprecedented move.

Since taking over the CFPB in February, the Trump administration has also summarily dismissed scores of employees, canceled more than 170 contracts, placed most staff on administrative leave, paused the effective dates for recently adopted regulations, moved to cancel the lease on CFPB headquarters and defaced the agency's website.

In the face of legal challenges, the agency has attempted to undo some of these changes and has agreed not to dismiss more CPFB workers for now.

But for that agreement, however, officials had planned to dismiss virtually all staff in mid-February, according to lawyers for an employee union.

(Reporting by Pete Schroeder; Editing by Franklin Paul and Mark Porter)